I have never much liked the phrase ‘saying your prayers’.
It seems to me to presuppose a degree of detachment which is spiritually both unhealthy and unreal. It’s as though your prayers exist ‘out there’ somewhere provided for you, already fixed in form and merely requiring you to repeat them. There is value, of course, in using already written prayers, not least in a corporate worship context. We have only to think of the Lord’s Prayer to realise that. But our personal praying needs to be grounded in relationship, not in repetition.
Praying squeezed out
Most churches find it difficult to gather more than a small fraction of their Sunday congregations to corporate prayer times. Many house groups are much stronger in Bible study, discussion and socialising then in praying together. Indeed, praying often seems to get squeezed out altogether. And even when we do meet to pray, we all know how much easier it is to spend time in sharing news and requests than actually speaking together to God in prayer.
